


Better Than Anything

by Ellessey



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Birthday, Domestic, Established Relationship, Implied/Referenced Sexual Content, M/M, Memories, Tooth-Rotting Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-13
Updated: 2018-06-13
Packaged: 2019-05-21 20:46:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,616
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14922554
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ellessey/pseuds/Ellessey
Summary: 'Koushi scrunches up his nose when Daichi kisses the tip of it, then gives him a bright smile. “I’ll see you tonight!”“Yep. Go drink your coffee while it’s hot.”Koushi promises that he will, but it takes a little while, after the front door has closed behind Daichi, for him to actually get off the bed. He then becomes very distracted when he stops in the bathroom and finds pink sticky notes posted on the mirror right above the sink, arranged in the shape of a heart.“You dork,” he says out loud, leaning in to read the notes scribbled on each one.'--Koushi wakes up looking forward to his annual "surprise" party, but after spending the day looking back on ten years of memories with Daichi, an unexpected change of plans for the evening is not at all unwelcome.





	Better Than Anything

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Birthday Suga!!!!!!!!!
> 
> This fic is a collaboration with [littleskrib](http://littleskrib.tumblr.com/), who came up with the idea of Daichi leaving birthday notes for Suga when we were trying to find just the right soft, sweet DaiSuga angle, let me play with it, and then [beautifully illustrated](http://littleskrib.tumblr.com/post/174862377854/koushi-scrunches-up-his-nose-when-daichi-kisses) the results. Thank you so much for making this happen with me Tami <333

Koushi’s twenty-fifth birthday begins with the rich scent of coffee, and warm lips pressed to his temple. He hums and reaches out with his eyes still closed, frowning when he catches the length of Daichi’s tie in his hand.

“There’s no working on Koushi Day,” he grumbles, and Daichi laughs.

“There is, unfortunately. But there’s breakfast, too, if you get out of bed.”

“Birthdays are _made_ for being in bed, Daichi. Think of all the ways we could occupy our time right here.”

“Think of how fired we would be.”

Koushi frowns harder, and Daichi grins at him, leaning in again to kiss his forehead before standing up. He’s so clean and handsome in his crisp white button-down, with his hair still a little wet from the shower. It’s entirely unfair that Koushi can’t just spend the whole day enjoying him, but…

I let you sleep in as long as I could,” Daichi says. “But I need to go, and you’ll be late for work if you don’t get started now.”

“Okaay,” Koushi says sadly.

“Don’t pout. It’s still gonna be a good day.”

Koushi sits up with a yawn, kicking the covers aside. “How good?”

“Have I ever _not_ made sure your birthday was perfect?”

“Hmm,” Koushi says, pretending to consider this, even though for as long as he’s known Daichi, even before they were dating, Daichi has put together parties for him that Koushi spends the entire rest of the year looking forward to. They’ve gotten smaller, since college ended, but they’re always full of energy, and good food, and all of Koushi’s favorite people. Even if he has to spend the whole of this day at work, he knows tonight will be all he could hope for.

“You’re thinking about this way too long.”

Koushi smiles, getting a good grip on Daichi’s tie again and pulling until he gives in and sinks down, settling on his knees between Koushi’s legs. “How good?” he repeats.

“Nice try,” Daichi says, with enough pink in his cheeks and heat in his voice that Koushi knows he would love to stay right here and show Koushi _how good,_ if he could. “Happy birthday, Kou.”

Koushi scrunches up his nose when Daichi kisses the tip of it, then gives him a bright smile. “I’ll see you tonight!”

“Yep. Go drink your coffee while it’s hot.”

Koushi promises that he will, but it takes a little while, after the front door has closed behind Daichi, for him to actually get off the bed. He then becomes very distracted when he stops in the bathroom and finds pink sticky notes posted on the mirror right above the sink, arranged in the shape of a heart.

“You dork,” he says out loud, leaning in to read the notes scribbled on each one.

 _Your parents' front porch_  
_The club room_  
_Back row of that awful play in third year_  
_The corner outside Asahi's_  
_The swings at the park between our houses_  
_And that thing that spins  
_ _And the little fort I got stuck in, at the top of the slide_

__

There are more of them, each one bringing a different memory to the surface of all of their first kisses. It would be almost unbelievable that Daichi remembers them so well still, if Koushi couldn't picture every one so clearly himself. He can feel the ghost of those dizzying new sensations, the wonder of losing his breath to someone else, the fire of hands finding new places to touch.

Usually the party is the only “surprise” on Koushi's birthday, but clearly Daichi had other ideas this year. It's completely unnecessary, but if he's decided to really go all out, Koushi certainly doesn't have any objections.

He leaves the sticky notes up (because he doesn't actually ever plan to take them down) and goes into the kitchen, only to find that there is not _just_ coffee and breakfast waiting there for him, as if that wouldn't have been more than enough.

The coffee is still warm, and it's absolutely perfect all on its own. Just the right amount of cream and sugar, stirred into his favorite mug. The heavy, ugly one they got at a gift shop when they visited Mount Fuji three years ago. They’d never even made it up the mountain, because Koushi twisted his ankle twenty minutes into the hike, but Daichi had helped him hobble into the shop to get a souvenir before they left anyway, laughing when Koushi picked out this oversized monstrosity.

The breakfast is a recreation of the first time Daichi cooked for Koushi, the first time Koushi had stayed overnight while Daichi's parents were out of town—an unevenly formed omelette more or less the size of Koushi's entire face. This one isn't burned in some places and undercooked in others, though. It's fluffy and flavorful, and Koushi is thoroughly impressed. He enjoys every bite while he reads over the notes that have been left for him here, blue ones this time, in a big circle around his meal.

_The bottom of Fuji-san, the top of Mt. Hiei, Nagano, Kumano Kodo, Daibutsu, Shiretoko…_

All of the places they've hiked and climbed together, some more successfully than others. All of them traced with memories of muscles burning pleasantly, Daichi’s shirt pressed damp and dark between his shoulder blades, kisses traded on sunlit trails and under the cover of leafy boughs.

Koushi is already definitely going to be late, so he takes the time to get his phone and send Daichi a message.

 **Koushi:** excuse me but who gave you the right to make me this emotional on a Wednesday morning?

 **Daichi:** how are the eggs?

 **Koushi:** excellent...god how you’ve grown  
**Koushi:** daichi thank you so much for all of this, it's been such a nice morning  
**Koushi:** I love you with every cell in my spoiled little body

 **Daichi:** I love every cell in your spoiled little body  
**Daichi:** I hope your spoiled little body is about to leave for work

 **Koushi:** it's....definitely about to get in the shower

 **Daichi:** koushi

 **Koushi:** I can't be smelly on my birthday daichi I'll talk to you later!!!

 **Daichi:** you don't smell just go to work!!

Koushi may not smell, but a hot shower is one of his favorite parts of the day, so even if it has to be quick he isn't going to miss it. He _does_ have to race to get out of the apartment though, and he's tremendously grateful that when he yanks open the fridge to find something to take for lunch, there's already a bento waiting for him, wrapped up in a bright furoshiki. He truly is far more spoiled than he actually deserves.

Once he arrives at work, not late enough to be noticeable, he settles into his corner of the office and resigns himself to happy, birthday things being put on hold until the end of the day, and dealing with normal, daily things. There’s grammar to critique, facts to check, calls to make, and it's alright of course. He doesn't _love_ his job—he wants to be _writing,_ not tidying up the writing of others—but this is how it goes, this is the ladder he has to climb, and Koushi isn't afraid of hard work.

Especially when at the end of each day he gets to go home to Daichi. He impersonates his chief editor, and complains about the bad coffee, and Daichi laughs and commiserates with him. He reminds him that work is only one part of his life, and the best part of it is right there, in their little kitchen with the light that always takes twenty-two seconds to come on after they've flicked the switch. (They even have a little song they've made up, that ends at the exact moment the darkness is broken.)

The mundane things do feel extra mundane today though, after a morning of lovely surprises. He takes his lunch outside with him when his break finally comes around, wanting to be under the clear sky instead of rectangular ceiling panels and the glare of a room full of computer monitors. Once he's found a suitable place to sit, he sets the bento on his knees and unties the knot in the cloth. A sprinkling of little, green balls of paper goes tumbling out as it falls open. Koushi is beginning to wonder when Daichi even had the time to write this many notes.

He smooths out the first one, but doesn’t know what to make of it. There’s an address on it that he doesn’t recognize. Does Daichi want him to go to it? Will the other notes have further clues? He opens up two more and finds that they have addresses as well, so they can’t all be proposed destinations, but perhaps past ones? Once he types the first one into his phone, he understands. It brings up a little ramen shop in Miyagi that they only went to once or twice before it was turned into something else. The first time they went there, though, was the day Daichi came out to Koushi, when they were sixteen. The next address is for the furniture warehouse where they picked out their first shared bed, and another is the jeweler where they chose their wedding bands.

Koushi’s cheeks are tear streaked by the time he’s solved each little mystery, and made his way through the thoughtfully packed meal of all his favorite lunch items. He finds, as he tucks the last little note into his pocket (this one is the park where Koushi told Daichi he was in love with him, and Daichi said he knew that already), that for the first time the thought of going home tonight and being surrounded by their friends is…not quite as appealing as it normally is. He _loves_ his birthday parties, and he loves how every single year Daichi doesn’t say a word about it until the last minute, even though he knows that Koushi knows. He’ll love it this time, too, of course. He just needs to pull his melted self together, so he’s fully prepared to put on an Oscar-worthy performance of surprise that every person in the room knows is fake, because they all know secrets can’t be kept from him.

 **Koushi:** dai  
**Koushi:** chi

 **Daichi:** yes?

 **Koushi:** please tell me how it is that i’m supposed to go back to work now all teary eyed and useless?

 **Daichi:** too spicy?

 **Koushi:** not the sushi you shit

 **Daichi:** xD i had fun with those ones...i’m glad you liked them

 **Koushi:** i loved them but i want to see you nooooow

 **Daichi:** six more hours!

 **Koushi:** that’s an eternity (ᗒᗣᗕ)

 **Daichi:** you can do it...go get your teary-eyed self back to work

 **Koushi:** i don’t wanna

 **Daichi:** then stay where you are and miss your deadlines :p...I have things to do

 **Koushi:** what kind of things Daichiiiiii  
**Koushi:** are they Koushi Day things??

 **Daichi:** lol..you’re such a child. see you later  <3

Koushi smiles and wraps his bento box up again. When he goes back inside he finds a card and a small, lopsided cupcake have been left at his desk.

“Don’t eat it,” the woman who sits across from him whispers. “Oshiro-san made it, and…”

Koushi grins back at her in understanding. Oshiro, who works in the sports department, is frequently bringing in his baked goods for the office to try, but as of yet he has failed to create anything remotely palatable.

“Did he make the icing, too?” he asks, because he is not above swiping it off with his finger and licking it up.

“Wouldn’t risk it.”

“Ah…alright,” he sighs, though he doesn’t really mind. His lunch was plenty filling, and if he knows Daichi, there will be more than enough things to fulfill his sweet tooth at the party tonight.

He opens up the oversized card before getting back to work, smiling at all the generic birthday messages, the names he doesn’t even recognize, and then the ones that he does, accompanied by little inside jokes and warm wishes. He’s tempted to leave his desk again and go visit his friends, or find Oshiro-san and thank him for the cupcake that he will pretend to have eaten, but he knows he should save that for the end of the day and be productive now. He blames Daichi and all of the memories he’s been stirring up for his intense difficulty focusing.

It only gets worse when he opens the front pocket of his briefcase to find the misplaced business card of a woman he needs to call, and his fingers catch on the sticky strip of an orange note. There are several of them, of course, once he digs them all out.

 _Your hair in first year...I don’t care what you say, it was so cute_  
_The way you believed in all my dreams for our team_  
_All your terrible nicknames for Asahi_  
_Sharing popsicles on the way home from practice_  
_The way you worked your ass off, always_  
_Those shorts you wore to training camp, with the pink stripe on the side_  
_Feeling like I could do anything because of you  
_ _Holding hands that one night, and then pretending we didn’t_

Koushi laughs softly at this last one. These must all be memories from the first year they knew each other, things that made Daichi start to feel something for Koushi. It wasn’t until late in their second year of high school that they finally shared all those things that had been building inside them, when they held hands and didn’t let go.

He texts Daichi, but he doesn’t get an answer this time. Probably because Daichi is actually working, or maybe because he’s preparing who knows what for tonight. Koushi can’t imagine what his husband might have up his sleeve for the party, after everything he’s already put into this day. Will it be bigger than ever? Is he going to whisk Koushi away to the site of their first date? Or the little attic room of Koushi’s old house where they slept together for the first time under a patchwork quilt?

Honestly, Koushi isn’t sure how much more his heart can take. He’s already dangerously close to just throwing himself on Daichi in front of their guests tonight, and finding any and every way to express all this affection and fondness, this need to be close to the reason for it all.

Of course, there aren’t any other places for Daichi to have hidden notes, so Koushi goes through the rest of the day as usual. He gets his work turned in, thanks his colleagues for the card (and the off-key rendition of Happy Birthday that breaks out just before it’s time to leave), and then heads home with all his notes smoothed flat and stacked carefully in his bag.

Usually Daichi beats him home, but he finds the apartment empty when he goes inside, just the traditional delayed reaction of the kitchen light to greet him. There are no decorations set up (and Daichi would never throw a party for him that didn’t involve over the top decorations, not because Daichi likes it that way, but because he knows Koushi does), so they must be going somewhere else tonight. He wonders what he should wear, and when Daichi will get home, and at what point it will really hit him that he’s now a quarter of a century old, and that the last decade of that time has been spent with Daichi in his life.

He spends a little time cleaning up the dishes he left in the sink that morning, and then playing around on his phone, but Daichi still hasn’t replied to his earlier messages, and it’s nearly an hour past when he would normally be home.

 **Koushi:** I’m getting lonesome Daichi  
**Koushi:** was I supposed to meet you somewhere and I totally missed it?

Daichi does not respond, and Koushi sighs and goes into the bathroom, smiling at the heart on the mirror. He has to lean over awkwardly to see his face in the center of it, but he doesn’t mind. Daichi may be the one who actually does this kind of ridiculous sentimental thing, but Koushi is just as bad and they both know it. These notes will be here until every one of them falls down on its own.

He washes his face and fixes his hair, then strips off his slacks and shirt, tossing them in the hamper by the door. He still doesn’t know what to wear, so he just stays in his boxers and white t-shirt when he goes into their bedroom and sits on the edge of the bed.

Now what? It’s not like Daichi to stay out of touch this long, and it’s really not like him to not completely spill every birthday party plan right before it happens, so Koushi knows how to dress and where to be. As it is now, he’s starting to feel like it would be a little silly to get dressed up for a party that is perhaps not even happening.

He looks around the room, trying to find some kind of clue, or something to occupy himself with, but there’s only the rumpled covers that he left behind in the morning, too rushed to make the bed. That’s at least something he can busy himself with, even though it’s more fun making it with Daichi, and pretending he can’t tell that everything is pulled way farther onto his own side. He starts by yanking the comforter off so he can get the sheets straightened up, but as he moves the pillows out of the way a flash of color catches his eye.

In the space uncovered by Daichi’s pillow there’s another heart made of notes, but it’s not only an outline this time—it’s filled in with two concentric hearts. Red on the outside, then orange, then yellow in the very center. A rainbow full of whatever Daichi chose to write about on little folded pieces of paper and tuck into their bed.

Koushi starts with the outer heart, unfolding the red notes one by one.

 _You bite your lip when you try to stay quiet_  
_You shiver when I touch the insides of your thighs as lightly as I can_  
_You can never keep your eyes open when I go down on you_  
_You always tell me what you like_  
_Your back is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen when I’m behind you and you’re on your knees_  
_You cry when I’m deep inside you_  
_Your voice goes so soft right before you finish  
_ _You hold me so tight after and I feel like I’m everything you need_

It’s hard to say if these notes have left Koushi more aroused or just overwhelmed with love. He doesn’t know how he ever got lucky enough to have Daichi as his partner. To spend his life with someone so attentive, and open, and unabashedly romantic.

The next set follows the same theme as the first, but instead of being little things about Koushi that only Daichi sees and knows, the orange notes are about Daichi.

 _I lose my mind when you bite my neck_  
_I like when you leave marks on me and I can see everywhere your mouth was for days_  
_I need you to remind me to breathe sometimes_  
_I love when you take me apart  
_ _I trust you completely_

Koushi doesn't know where Daichi is, or what they're supposed to do with the rest of this night, but he wants his husband home with him right now. He wants everything Daichi has written here, even though he's had it all before.

The last few notes, almost a golden yellow, are about both of them. Though really, all of them have been. Every little thought and memory and observation that Daichi has set down in ink and left for Koushi to find.

 _We were each other’s firsts_  
_We make each other feel so good and so safe  
_ _We fit like we were actually made for each other, and I think we were_

Koushi’s eyes are wet again, and he doesn’t bother wiping it away when the moisture spreads to his cheeks. He’s still sitting there sniffling, with a sunset of notes all over his lap, when the front door clicks loudly as it’s unlocked.

“Koushi, you here? I’m so sorry, I—”

“I’m in here!” Koushi calls, getting off the bed and rushing to go see Daichi, meeting him right in the doorway of their room. “What…what happened to you?”

He isn’t asking about Daichi’s marked lateness, although he certainly had been wondering about that up until this point. What he wants to know now, though, is why his husband has shown up with tragically mussed hair, a loosened tie, shirt sleeves rolled up, and such an anxious and harrassed expression on his face that Suga forgets about the lateness altogether.

“I’m so, so sorry,” Daichi says. “Your party totally fell apart, like completely. It imploded. It’s gone.”

Koushi would laugh at how dramatic his party’s demise sounds, but Daichi looks so regretful that Koushi wouldn’t dare make light of it just yet. “What—”

“It wasn’t going to be the biggest one ever anyway.” Daichi’s shoulders slump as he fiddles with his tie, tugging the knot down a little lower and letting Koushi slip it over his head for him as he goes on. “It was just so hard to coordinate with everyone’s schedules, especially in the middle of the week. And God, like everyone we know is on a business trip right now? I don’t even know how that’s _possible.”_

“I don’t know,” Koushi says, smiling as he nudges away Daichi’s hands, which were completely failing to undo his buttons, and sets to work on them himself. “I guess this is what happens in the grown-up world.”

“I guess,” Daichi says. “I still had something planned, but I did all the…” He looks over at the bed, the scattered notes lying across it like blossoms, and smiles a little. “…the notes, so it would still be special even if the party wasn’t great, but then—”

“Daichi—” Koushi tries to cut him off, to tell him that the notes that were meant to make up for something were actually better than anything he could have asked for, but Daichi is not finished.

“Then the last people just dropped like flies all at once this afternoon. Sick kid, delayed flight, even the restaurant we were having it at called just before I left work and said they accidentally double booked us. Like… _how?”_

“How,” Koushi repeats, getting the last button undone.

“So I was trying to find another place to go, but then our actual very last person cancelled, and—”

“Daichi, I really—”

“I wanted this one to be so good for you. It’s twenty-five! And I don’t even have a cake for you because Ryuu was supposed to bring it, and—”

“ _Daichi,_ just stop for a second. I want you to listen to me.”

“But—”

“No, listen,” Koushi repeats, gripping the open collar of Daichi’s shirt. “You’re listening?”

Daichi nods obediently, and it’s incredibly cute. Koushi takes a moment to kiss the serious line of his lips quickly before he continues.

“I’m so sorry that you’ve been running around trying to make this happen, and that it just absolutely refused to, because I know how hard you work on these things for me, and I love that. I _love_ you.”

“I know you do,” Daichi says, looking marginally less anguished, but still so disappointed. “But I—”

“I’m not finished,” Koushi says. “I’m sorry you had to deal with it falling apart, but I’m _not_ sorry that my party is gone.”

“You don’t have to say that, Koushi. You love your parties. You get so happy and hyper, and I love making you feel that way.”

If Daichi says one more unbelievably precious thing, Koushi won’t be at all surprised if his own heart just bursts. He is at maximum capacity. He needs to start letting out all this emotion and love, this wonderful aching that’s been intensifying in his chest all day long.

“Come here,” he says, taking Daichi’s wrist and pulling him over to their bed. “Sit.”

Daichi unbuckles his belt and undoes his slacks, stepping out of them before joining Koushi in the nest of their unmade sheets. The comforter is still lying in a heap on the floor, and there's a good chance it will just stay there.

“I _do_ love the parties,” Koushi says. “They’re so much fun, and they’re so special because you know everything that I love, and I started this day thinking that the only thing Koushi Day needed was a perfect birthday bash.”

Daichi smiles a little, picking up one of the yellow notes as he listens.

“But _then…_ I spent this whole day finding out all the little things that have mattered to you. All the memories of me and our lives that have stayed with you, that have stayed with me, too, and I’ve been falling in love with us all over again, Daichi. Like, I never forgot, about any of these things, but to just be showered in them? And to know that you…that you…”

Koushi trails off, because he’s sniffling again, and he’s not quite sure what he’s trying to say. He just knows that Daichi loves him more than he even knows how to process, and that he loves Daichi more than any words could hope to convey.

“I just wanted you to know how important you are to me,” Daichi says, holding out his hand with the yellow note still bright at its center, and then closing his fingers around Koushi’s, the paper pressed between their palms. “When we celebrate your birthday I’m not just doing it because it’s tradition, or expected, or whatever. It’s literally a celebration of you being in the world, and I’m so glad that you are, Koushi. I’m so glad that you’re mine.”

Daichi is not helping at all with the crying, or the full heart, or the inability to put the right words together. He is, in fact, doing the opposite of that. But he’s been doing that since Koushi got up this morning, and he doesn’t really mind being so overwhelmed when it feels this good.

“I know,” Koushi says. “I know, you’ve been showing me that all day, and I’m just…all I wanted to do when I got home from work was see you. And then I read these last notes, and _God,_ Daichi. I don’t want a party this year, I really don’t. I just want you, and no one else. I want us, right here at home. This is _perfect.”_

Any remaining disappointment has lifted from Daichi’s face, and he smiles, stroking his thumb over the back of Koushi’s hand. “Yeah,” he agrees. “Yeah, I think so too.”

“Good,” Koushi says. “So let’s just…here, hang on. Get that off.” He slips his hand free so he can help push Daichi’s button-down off his shoulders, and Daichi pulls it the rest of the way off, leaving him in an undershirt and boxers, just like Koushi.

“So we either get all dressed up for a party, or hang out in bed in our underwear?” Daichi asks. “There’s no in between?”

“Nope,” Koushi says. “This is it. There are no gray areas on Koushi Day.”

“What about really shitty back-up plan desserts? Are those okay?”

“What desserts? Have you been holding out on me? On my _birthday,_ Daichi?”

Daichi grins, that same wide, warm smile that Koushi has been in love with for so many years now, the one that is tied to countless happy memories. It was the way he smiled before they exchanged their vows, hopeful and bright and certain, and the way he smiled the first time Koushi was inside him, when Koushi slipped out accidentally (and dramatically) in the middle of it, and they both lost it. Finally managing to get the laughter under control enough to keep going, but never losing the breathlessness and upturned lips. It was like that after their very first kiss, too, with everything in Daichi’s face setting Koushi’s heart racing, his stomach fluttering, just as much as the touch of his lips had. And it’s never stopped doing those things, somehow, because Daichi’s joy is so beautiful, and knowing Koushi is what brings that smile to his face is…indescribable. It’s better than anything.

“Hang on,” Daichi says, leaving Koushi there with his heart about to explode once more. He comes back a moment later with a plastic shopping bag, dropping it in front of Koushi after he’s climbed back on the bed. “Happy twenty-fifth birthday, Koushi. I hope you like it.”

Koushi hasn’t stopped smiling since Daichi got home, and his cheeks are starting to get sore, but he smiles a little bigger now, reaching into the bag and pulling out his spoils.

There are several assorted vending machine snack cakes, wrapped up in their little cellophane sleeves, and one copy of Blade Runner, which is possibly Koushi’s favorite movie of all time, and also the one they’ve had the worst luck actually keeping in their possession. His first one, given to him by his dad, was borrowed by a friend and never returned. When Daichi bought him a new one the following Christmas to replace it, that one was lost in the move from their college dorms to their first apartment. Another one was eaten by their old dvd player, and the last copy was the victim of Koushi forgetting to put it back in its case, and Daichi stepping on it in the middle of the night on his way to get a glass of water.

“You said we were never buying this again!” Koushi says, smoothing his hand over the familiar cover.

“You _know_ we’re gonna lose it, at best.”

“I know,” Koushi says. He’s sure that they will, and he knows they could easily rent it, or buy a digital copy, but he loves having it in his hands right now, and he loves that in all the frenzy of trying to salvage a collapsing party, Daichi thought of this and made it happen. “How could you not know what a good present this is? You could have walked in the door, handed me this, and said nothing else.”

“I’ve bought it for you _four times_ now, Koushi,” Daichi laughs. “It’s not exactly original.”

“That makes it even _better,”_ Koushi says, and Daichi tries to shake his head before Koushi catches his face between his hands. “I love you so much. So, so much. _Thank you.”_

Daichi’s answering smile, soft and fond, does just as much to Koushi’s heart as his broad grin. This is the smile that’s been there every time he’s indulged one of Koushi’s whims; every time they’ve been wrapped in each other’s arms, sleepy and warm; every time Koushi has told him endlessly how much he loves him, and Daichi has already known.

“You’re welcome,” he says, taking Koushi’s hands in his own so he’s free to lean closer to him. “If you don’t mind waiting a bit to watch it…”

Koushi does not mind, particularly not with Daichi nosing against his ear, brushing his mouth along his jawline, then bringing their lips together. He minds even less when Daichi slips his hand up the back of his shirt, drawing him closer, supporting him as he lays Koushi down over the garden of love notes. Taking his breath away with slow, heated kisses, and strong hands that know exactly how to hold Koushi, how to touch him and bring him alive.

“We could…make use of these, you know,” Koushi says, fingers drifting over the notes all around them and plucking up a red one.

“Which one is it?” Daichi asks, his five o’clock shadow grazing Koushi’s collarbone as he presses a kiss to his neck

“Hmm, the one about how I can’t keep my eyes open when…when you…”

Koushi doesn’t need to go on. Daichi’s hands have already slid down to Koushi’s hips, thumbs catching in the waistband of his boxers to drag them off as he kisses his way down Koushi’s chest, his breath hot through the cotton of his t-shirt.

“We’re doing…mmm…an orange one next,” Koushi says, his fingers carding through Daichi’s short hair. He really likes where the red note is taking them, but Daichi has done so much for him today, and Koushi wants to give back, too. He wants to write his own notes, even if it’s just with his hands on Daichi’s skin, of all the little things he knows about his husband. All the ways he knows how to love him best.

Daichi looks up at him, all dark eyes and warmth and anticipation, because even with all of the things they’ve experienced together, all the stacks of colorful paper squares they could fill, they still want more. They still have so much ahead of them to share.

“We can do as many as you want,” Daichi says. “We have the whole night.”

Koushi smiles, and he drinks in everything about Daichi, the flush in his cheeks and the broad line of his shoulders, before he closes his eyes. They don’t have anywhere to go, or anyone to see, they just have this—rumpled sheets and a million ways to say _I love you—_ and this is all that he wants.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I'm [ellessey-writes](http://ellessey-writes.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr, and [karasuno123](https://twitter.com/karasuno123) on Twitter!
> 
> You can find many more of my DaiSuga works on AO3 [here](https://archiveofourown.org/works?utf8=%E2%9C%93&commit=Sort+and+Filter&work_search%5Bsort_column%5D=revised_at&work_search%5Brelationship_ids%5D%5B%5D=836528&work_search%5Bother_tag_names%5D=&work_search%5Bquery%5D=&work_search%5Blanguage_id%5D=&work_search%5Bcomplete%5D=0&user_id=Ellessey).


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